The Cyclopedia of New Zealand [Wellington Provincial District]

The Hutt County Council

The Hutt County Council.

The Hutt County Council
has jurisdiction over the south-westerly portion of the North Island; the boundary line, dividing the county from the adjacent County of Horowhenua, follows the course of the Walkanae river from the sea, and crosses the Rimutaka at the Sum it, and thence the eastern boundary separating the County of Wairarapa South stretches southwards to Cape Turakirae, to the west of Palliser Pay. The county is divided into eight ridings, viz., Belmont, Epuni, Horokiwi, Makara, Mungaroa, Porirua, Wainui-o-mata, and Whareroa. Each riding elects one councillor, save Porirua, which returns two. The present members are Messrs. Henry Cook (chairman), John Wakeham, David Speedy, Charles William Brown, William Jillett, Frank Anson Majendie, Frederick Bradey, Henry Augustus Field, and George Brown. The Makara Riding contains two road districts, Makara and Seatoun, and the Johnsonville Town District forms part of the Porirua Riding. The Council has control over a district which has little short of one million pounds worth of reteable property, after allowing for exemptions. A general rate of three-farthings in the pound is levied over the entire district, with the exception of the Makara Riding, where the rate is but one farthing in the pound. There is also a separate rate of a halfpenny in the pound, which applies to the whole district, less the road and town districts. The Council exercises jurisdiction as a local Board of Health, collects the dog tax, and has power to abate nuisances, etc. The gross total revenue for the year ending the 31st of March, 1895, amounted to £6453 12s. 4d.

Mr. Harry Dunstan Atkinson, the Clerk and Treasurer to the Hutt County Council, is the eldest son of the late Hon. Sir H. A. Atkinson, Speaker of the Legislative Council, Mr. Atkinson was born at Hurworth, near New Plymouth, in 1857, and was
educated at various private schools in New Zealand and in England. From 1876 till 1892 he was engaged in outdoor pursuits, first in Taranaki, where he managed one of his father's farms, and afterwards took it over on his own account. For two years after this Mr. Atkinson was settled in Parua Bay, Whangarei Harbour, Auckland, where he was engaged in orange culture. Locating in the Hutt Valley, he went into market gardening for five or six years, till he was appointed to his position as clerk and treasurer of the Hutt County Council in August, 1892. Mr. Atkinson was married on the 6th of June, 1885, to the second daughter of the late Mr. Henry Adams, solicitor, of Nelson.

Mr. John Golder, Rate Collector, Inspector of Roads, Slaughterhouses, and Nuisances; Valuer, and Returning Officer for the Hutt County Council, was born at the Lower Hutt on the 22nd of July, 1849. His father, Mr. William Golder, who published sundry poems, arrived with the early Port Nicholson settlers per “Bengal Merchant,” in March, 1840. The subject of this paragraph—the youngest son—received his education in his native place. He has been well known in the district as working foreman of roads, first under the Provincial Government till the abolition of the provinces, and since under the Council till May, 1893, when he was promoted to the important offices which he has filled since that time. In 1877 Mr. Golder was married to Miss Jane, daughter of Mr. Alexander G. Martin, an old settler at the Upper Hutt, and has a family of nine children — three daughters and six sons.